Behind Blue Eyes
by Bellsie805
Summary: The patient was the obligatory, boring gray that is life, but each doctor chose to see a different coloronly people so damaged could see the rainbow in the gray of oblivion.
1. Dr Robert Chase

**Author's Note: **I heard this on _Cold Case _at the end of the season finale. So, because everyone's favorite doctor has gorgeous blue eyes, this is another piece that delves into the psyches of the characters. A good dose of angst, maybe romance, and my twisted philosophy is to be found herein. I don't own _House_ or "Behind Blue Eyes."

_No one knows what it's like_

_To be the bad man_

Black and blue and faded colors marked the daily passage of time. They dwelled in the cramped apartment of life knowing only that death would come too soon and that they would work to prevent the inevitable. There were gray opinions of life and the single black and white fact—death comes and no one can prevent its appearance.

The team had just lost a patient that was not actually their patient in the first place. It was not unexpected—cancer was in stage four. The malignant cells had spread. Life had begun to pack its boxes of blood and breath and mail them to the mansion where Death resided. There had been many successes, but today had not been one.

Death was a preoccupation for only one night. Spending more time being miserable over a lost cause was not what doctors did. But this affected them all so deeply because each saw the patient differently. Chase saw the child of an alcoholic. Foreman saw someone who had screwed up and fixed their mistakes. Cameron saw longing and a kindred spirit. Cuddy saw how the oppressiveness of society had almost made the patient succumb under the weight of mindless expectations. Wilson noticed too many divorces and long-forgotten tête-à-têtes. And House saw brilliant blue eyes that were slowly dying.

If I see blue I know it's blue because I know what blue looks like. But you don't have to see blue. Why can't you see red when I see blue or green when I see red? Do you feel happy when I find that happiness is what I call sorrow? I like to live in the mind-set that everyone sees what they want. The patient was the obligatory, boring gray that is life, but each doctor chose to see a different color—

Only people so damaged could see the rainbow in the gray of oblivion.

_To be the sad man_

_Behind blue eyes_

The photo album was leather that supposedly became suppler with the constant contact of oil from human hands. Chase thought that and the philosophy blaring from his television was a load of bullshit. Who cared about whether or not green was green? And who actually believed leather kept the pictures safer than a crappy plastic album? He threw the picture-filled book to ground and got up to walk around his living room.

Cory Lind died at 5:50 and Chase was unable to prevent death from coming. Cory's eyes closed and the soul had evaporated out of the eyes of this patient. Oh, yes, Lind was quite the fighter, Chase admitted. Quite the fighter.

And quite the history. Cory Lind grew up with an alcoholic father who beat him regularly. He went to school with bruises up and down his body, he had told Chase, and never had sleepovers for fear that his father would come home one night and beat the shit out of not only Cory, but also the friend staying the night.

Chase, of course, had been shocked when as soon as Cory saw the blonde-haired Aussie he informed him that he knew about Chase's father's descent into the amber-black hole that was alcoholism. It was a quick comment. Lind didn't like mincing words. Apparently, dying has that affect on a person.

"My father was an alcoholic and so's yours."

He said it with such certainty that Chase knew better than to ask how he knew. His blue eyes sparkled benevolently. Cory reminded Chase of Santa Claus—the white hair, thick beard and round figure. Chase had been brought on the case because House had been asked by Wilson to meet this man. Chase hadn't known why Wilson simply requested House have a meeting with Lind and was sent first (as punishment for some unspoken rule broken).

Chase walked into the room equipped with Cory's medical chart and was going to ask him medical questions before Cory interrupted him with the previously unknown fact of their shared pain. Chase didn't bother to ask why, for Cory had another comment that left his lips even before Chase's jaw came back together.

"I hated it. Alcohol made him hit me and beat me and made me think he didn't love me. Funny how his funeral was the best and worst day of my life. Must have been harder for you, watching your powerful father disintegrate into distilled alcohol."

Chase remembered the twinkling in the eyes of Lind as he told secrets that Chase had never told anyone.

"Sit. Let's talk."

So Chase sat. And they talked. And Chase felt tears in his eyes for the first time in many, many years. It was a brief half an hour before Foreman came to check on Cory (and, at the same time, Chase). Chase had left in a hurry. He hadn't even said goodbye to the man who had so uncannily knew the depths of his secrets.

He left at 2:30. House informed them the man died at 5:50. Three hours and twenty minutes of life went by after Chase had left. And now, because of guilt and questions, Chase was staring at the photo album.

He opened it up and flipped through the pages. There was a picture of he and his father fishing off the shore of Sydney. His father at the hospital. The mansion in Sydney. The family portrait. His sister, brother…

And then there was the picture that Chase hated. It was his father, bottle firmly tucked in hand, smiling benignly. Chase was standing next to him. There was anger firmly embedded in his father's eyes and endless hurt found in his. Chase took a deep breath and looked at the phone. He crossed the room quickly.

The number was old and he was afraid to call. His father had always intimidated him and Chase had grown up seeking praise from adults around him. Even now, he sought out the admiration of people. He had groveled to Vogler because he wanted the attention and the acclamation that House refused to give him. And now he was calling the most brilliant surgeon he knew and the man who had made him into the Dr. Robert Chase—supposedly supreme traitor.

The phone weighed a thousand pounds in his hands and he closed his eyes and dialed the number. Cory Lind had told him today that the last time he had ever talked to his father was ten years before the funeral. As happy as he was during his father's funeral, Lind told Chase that he never got over his last words to his father on the phone a decade prior to the wind-swept burial day.

"I told him I hated him," Cory explained slowly.

"Oh, God," Chase replied.

"The phone wasn't invented so it could collect dust because of disuse," was Cory's only comment.

"Hello?"

The phone had connected, done its job, and reached Chase's father in Australia. There was only one word appropriate for the commencement of the conversation.

"Hi, Dad."


	2. Dr Eric Foreman

**Author's Note: **This is another multi-chapter, multi-character feeling analysis by moi. I truly enjoy getting inside of these people's minds, so stay with me. Princessklutz04, _Behind Blue Eyes_ is originally sung by The Who and that's the version I like/use. Just an FYI. (I'm a big sucker for old music…my friends hate me for it. )

_No one knows what it's like_

_To be hated_

It was the colored picture of a black man in an orange jumper that had been bothering him all night. Foreman had a glass of red wine in one hand and the picture of his younger self staring back hauntingly at him. The wine tasted horribly—too young, too old, too layered? He wasn't an oenophile and never liked pretentious wine. He had grown up "on the streets;" he wasn't a surgeon's son like Chase and thus had no taste for wine. Except for now, when wine was the only alcohol in the house, he never drank it. But Cory Lind, former lock-picker and present dead man, made him crave the alcohol. Drunk did not start to describe how much he wanted to be lost tonight.

Foreman had gone, on House's order, to check on Chase in Lind's room. Taking a medical history should not take a half an hour, House and Foreman both knew that, but it was Foreman (of course) who had to go and drag Chase out of the room.

He had never seen Chase so…emotional. His eyes were watery and Foreman knew it was not from some allergic reaction or sinus infection—he had left without answering why he had taken so long, leaving a bewildered Foreman with a very wrinkled man looking back at him.

"I've got a few hours more out of this life and a few more lives to change," the old black man murmured.

"Excuse me, sir?"

"I was fifteen and I stole $300 worth of jewelry from some rich lady's house. Her dog bit me in the leg and I was tried. Got myself a plea deal and got off with community service. I became a distinguished lawyer. But the obstacles in life are what makes a man learn from mistakes and experience."

Foreman had stared at the man and saw the papyrus that was his skin. He saw the hairless head and sly grin. He saw himself in forty years and he shivered.

He stared into the glass of wine and looked at the reflection of a rippled man. He thought back to Cory.

"It's hard, isn't? To gain the respect of people once they know you're a…_criminal_," Lind spit the word out with a venomous passion.

"How…"

"Take a seat, my dear Dr. Foreman. We need to talk."

Foreman still didn't remember if he had told him his name or not. But he had sat and listened to the stories Cory told of employers looking at him with disdain not only because he was black, but also because he was black with a record.

"I'm self-made and so are you."

The statement was true and Foreman recalled nodding his head in agreement. Now, he looked back down at the picture of his earlier self. Self-made all right.

He had spent half an hour in the room, just like Chase had. When Cameron had come in and announced that it was three o'clock and time for Lind's medicine, Foreman realized that, like Chase, there were tears begging to escape from his eyes. He had turned, and walked head-down past Cameron.

But now he was alone with himself and the demons that made a living off his soul. He had broken into the house at sixteen because he hated those rich people that lived there. He hated the ideals that he would never be able to reach. He needed the money for his family. Well, not so much for his family, but the court liked that excuse better than, "No one cares about you in this damn world, so I was takin' care of myself."

He looked at the picture again. His face was strong, but his eyes were worried in it. The taut facial muscles said "I'm _not_ afraid," but the eyes begged to differ. He turned his head away.

He made it through college and medical school and residency and field training, all the while hiding his unsavory past. Now, House was making up for all those lost, taunting years.

"He does it because he admires you and can't tell you that. You shouldn't look for pity. Pity makes a strong man die."

Lind smiled mysteriously and turned his head. This man had entranced Foreman. So full of wisdom…and too soon dead.

Wine did not burn his throat like other alcohol did. It massaged and caressed his esophagus as it made its way on its journey through his body, through his bloodstream. The red wine looked liked blood, and he imagined it mixed prettily when the two met.

"What is worse for you? Being looked on like a criminal by silent eyes or being called out for being one by prying mouths? My personal worst was when they look and say nothing. That hurts the most. They treat you like you're not even human anymore. It's amazing how the most "civilized" people lack civility and decency towards other humans. The human condition. Doesn't it amaze you?"

Lind's blue eyes were clear and questioning. He was right and he knew it; Foreman did not need to respond.

But here he was thinking again of the question. What was worse? He knew the answer as he gazed on the picture and the fire that burned in the fireplace. The accusing stares of cowards not willing to speak. _Thief, burglar_…

The flames taunted him like the unspeaking eyes of the people who had looked on him as if he was the dirt beneath their feet. With each addition of oxygen and wood to the fire, the flames leaped higher and taunted louder. Foreman's ears burned and he slammed the wine glass on the table with a ferocious "bang!"

He grabbed the old photograph of the young man in the orange suit. He walked over to the teasing fire and, with the loosening of his hand muscles, he let the photo fall into the fire.

He watched as the flames covered the picture and folded in on themselves. As they devoured the pictures they ate away at their compatriots.

The hot flames had never looked so cold.


	3. Dr Allison Cameron

**Author's Note: **In this fic's universe, Stacy has not yet appeared. All Cameron knows is that someone broke House's heart five years ago.

_To be fated_

_To telling only lies_

The corsage's petals were curling at the edges and starting to brown. It was in a plastic Tupperware container. She hadn't had time to press it and never liked arts and crafts anyway. Tonight she had gotten out another old corsage—from her prom—and laid it next to the plastic-caged one. She hated the dead flowers.

House had sent her to get Foreman when he had, like Chase, spent an extraordinarily long time in a patient's room when he was just retrieving a fellow doctor. She walked in and Foreman walked out, head down, shame in his shuffle. She smiled gently at the relatively young woman who lay on the bed. Cameron noticed she had her hands clasped together and looked calm.

"He likes you."

"What?"

"And you like him. It's sweet, to see you two go for each other's throat time and time again. My husband and I used to do that. He was twenty years older than I am, so…"

Cameron had watched as the girl twisted a large diamond engagement ring around her left ring finger. Cory hadn't finished the sentence, and thus, Cameron never found out if her husband really was dead or if they were simply divorced. But it didn't matter anymore, because Cory Lind had died on a few hours after Cameron had left the room—she was still an enigma when Cuddy had come to collect Cameron.

But now she stood in front of her kitchen counter staring at two corsages. She had been there for the better part of an hour she thought. Time, though, seemed superfluous when her heart felt like it was straining for something that could never be.

"My husband died when I was seventeen and he was eighteen. A drunk driver hit him two weeks after our wedding. And then I went to college and fell in love with my professor, twenty years my senior. I came back a few years after I graduated and we married. Too young the first time and too old the second. I was a prom queen, too, you know."

The prom queen reference made her realize that this must be more than a simple coincidence. She stood looking at her old prom corsage and then she reached out and gently touched it.

She had been too young to be a widow. She knew that and she knew that House thought she was stupid and naïve. She remembered her prom. It was a cheesy affair, like proms usually are, but she was prom queen. She was his wife. She wore a rhinestone tiara, which reflected the lights of the gym with startling brightness. At the hospital, she had worn white, which made her glow like an angel, her husband had told her. She had danced and enjoyed dancing. She had watched him die and she never liked dancing with her dying husband.

She reached for the Tupperware container and took off the lid. She touched the formerly silky petals and started to cry. The tears mixed with the brown of the flower and it started to crinkle with the impact of the tears.

"Do you cry alone and, when you do, does it kill you to know that he pretends he doesn't care?"

Cameron hadn't responded to Cory's remarkably accurate statement, but when she was here, all by herself in a kitchen that muffled her cries, it didn't matter that Cory knew her life story better than she did. Oh, yes, did she cry alone. All the time she cried, and over dead flowers that had not been alive in more than ten years.

And that was she now. She had been dead for more than ten years. Ten years since anyone had loved her. House had only endured the death from love for five years, half the time she had. She was resigned to the fact that she was dead until love returned and when love did rear its fascinating head, she attacked it with a passionate fervor. Maybe that's why she saw her chance with House.

She was nearing thirty and saw her life slipping away. Saving peoples' lives was the only thing that saved her. She had become a doctor for a sole reason—she needed something for which to live.

She pushed herself away from the corsages and with a trembling hand she reached for her glass of water. She missed it and it fell to the floor—shattering into many pieces. She gave a small yell when it fell and immediately went to the ground, collecting the pieces of the sharp, broken glass. One of the pieces was incredibly sharp and left a gash in her palm.

"There's a song. My personal favorite that contains the lyrics, _you bleed just to know you're alive_. I used to be so happy to get a paper cut. I could feel! When I got cancer, then, _then_ I realized I was human. Painfully so."

"Even after your…"

"Even after my first husband died, I was immune to pain. Like you are. You absorb the damage of another wrecked man. Over and over again you do it because you feel like you must. It gives you a reason to live."

The clear blue eyes had drilled into Cameron's and she had been stuck to the floor in Cory's room. And now, as she bled she reached up to grab a towel, but instead came back down with both corsages. She had knocked them off her counter and now her blood fell on the dead flowers.

There was a knock at the door, and Cameron knew it was just one of the neighbors checking on her to make sure she was okay. Cameron didn't think she had screamed that loud, but she was glad they were concerned. The knocking, though, was persistent. And loud. And it sounded of wood on…

She crawled into a little ball behind the island that sat in her kitchen. If he wanted in bad enough he'd break down the damn door.

"Let him chase after you," were Cory's last words to her before Cuddy pulled Cameron out of the room.

Cameron looked at her prom corsage as she heard House sifting around outside her apartment for a spare key.

The old, brown flowers now contained color for the first time in a decade.


	4. Dr Lisa Cuddy

**Author's Note: **From last chapter, the prom queen discourse was inspired by veronicca05. Thanks! P. Klutz, _Iris_, by the Goo Goo Dolls contain the lyrics that I used in last chapter. Oh, and to clarify—Chase was with Cory from 2:30-3, Foreman from 3-3:30, Cameron from 3:30-4. I got myself confused there. ;-)

_But my dreams_

_They aren't as empty_

_As my conscience seems to be_

She looked at the myriad of perfume bottles that lined her bathroom vanity. She had the relatively new Prada fragrance (it had been a gift—she really didn't like it very much). She had Chance by Chanel (that she did like—it was perfect.) Ralph Lauren's Cool defied the other stodgy looking bottles with its hot-pink hue and tangy smell. She wore it when she wanted sex.

Cuddy had simply gone to rescue Cameron. House had asked her to check up on the girl (God knows House couldn't do it himself—it was 4…_General Hospital _rerun!). While he limped back to his office, she went to get Cameron.

Cameron looked fascinated by the woman who was lying in the bed and had looked reluctant to leave. But leave she did and Cuddy took her place in the room. She was just going to take the old woman's vitals when the lady stopped her.

"I got accused of using sex to work my way up the ladder. Can't help it if you're born with boobs," was the woman's flippant remark.

Cuddy had set her mouth in a firm line. She got this from everyone, so this didn't surprise her.

"Ma'am, I'm just going to…"

"Check my vitals. Every doctor's come in here and every doctor's tried to check and every doctor ends up stayin' and havin' a chat with me."

"Ma'am, I have a…"

"Hospital to run. And you _must_ impress everyone because you're a _woman_ and you don't think they think you can do the job. Honey, give it up! _You_ know you're competent. I never let it bother me that I was a woman in the boy's club."

Cuddy had stared at her and now as she stared in the mirror she knew the woman had been right. She traced the thin lines at the edge of her mouth and at the edge of her eyes. She saw where the powdery foundation had infiltrated into the lines, filling them. Her large eyes strained in the mirror to analyze her face—to analyze herself.

"How many bottles of perfume do you keep lined up in your bathroom? One for every occasion, I imagine. Don't worry, I did the same thing."

She looked at her colored bottles, each containing a different liquid. Each containing a different personality, a different outfit, a different cover…

"No one will ever believe in you unless you believe in you. Believe me, I've learned that this is a dog-eat-dog world and the only people who look out for you is you. We're humans, Dr. Cuddy, and humans have that terrible fault about not giving a damn about one another. Haven't you ever noticed that? You're in medicine and everything, but don't you just want to scream sometimes? Scream at patients for being stubborn, stupid, and _sick_? I was a lawyer and I wanted to kick some of my clients."

The woman had smiled and her blue eyes had twinkled like she was sharing some grand joke. Cuddy's mouth had turned down into a frown and Cory Lind just laughed.

"You look like a child! Is that how _he _looks when he throws those indignant, childish hissy fits?"

"I must be going," she had informed her with a hiss.

"Sit down. What are you going to do? Worry about whether or not someone will love you before you're fifty? Someone will, but please. Get over yourself."

Cuddy was chastised, but intrigued. She had stood with her arms crossed.

"Defensiveness gets us nowhere. Drop your defenses and stop playing offense. _Women_ are expected to be delicate creatures. Play it to your advantage, just like you do with your boobs."

"You have no right telling me this!"

"Yes, I do. Because I was you once. I basked in the glow of attention and enjoyed playing hardball with the guys. But, Jesus was I insecure. Just like you are. That's why I wore my high-heels and my daring blouses. That's why I let men get to me and have their way with me. I never believed in myself until I was dying. Funny, isn't it?"

And now Cuddy was home staring at her too-much-made-up face in a mirror over the aptly titled _vanity_. She was a vain person and she knew she was pretty, but God knows that never helped with anything that involved herself. Yes, the men would fawn, but how could Lisa Cuddy, the one inside of the shell, ever like what she saw?

Too many wrinkles, too many sags, too many _too manys_. Why had she stayed to listen to Cory Lind lecture her on the pressures of women in society? Why? Because she knew that in her heart (somewhere and if she had one) she knew it was true. People told her she'd be great, fabulous, _famous_, but she never believed them. She watched others crash and never become…well, never become. And that's why perhaps she never had any confidence in herself.

"Dr. Cuddy, being beautiful gets you _somewhere_. But you have something else and you overlook it. You're smart. Use that to your advantage."

Smart and intimidating—that's why she wore the low-cut blouses. How was she supposed to get a man to sleep with her if they were afraid of her? Show her breasts—that's how.

"I used to think when I was a young girl that when I grew up people would respect me for being smart. But, guys just tended to be scared. I'm sure you know the feeling."

Like the others, she had sat there with Cory Lind for half an hour. She spent half an hour being told stories of what a demanding world does to a strong woman. Beats her down until she conforms. Only the strongest ever survive.

She looked down again at all the scattered cosmetics. If she slathered on enough foundation, concealer, blush, bronzer, eye shadow, and lipstick then maybe she would look pretty enough for the day. Her eyes wandered to the perfume. Maybe if she sprayed the right combination they would be intoxicated by her smell—

She wanted love because she already had success. She was old enough now to really regret not having children—not having small human beings to raise and care for—and _love_.

"No, I don't have any relatives, if you're curious. That's what happens—it's success or love and I wanted and chose success. I believe you might want the same decision," Cory Lind had winked.

Cory Lind had died only an hour or so after she had left the room. And Cuddy had never told the woman what she wanted to have.

No, Lisa Cuddy hadn't told Cory Lind what she desired more—

Because she wasn't so sure herself.


	5. Dr James Wilson

**Author's Note:** Pink Floyd lyrics belong to Pink Floyd. Taken from the song _Wish You Were Here_. House's chapter is next. Hang in there, 'cause I personally don't like this chapter.

_I have hours, only lonely_

_My love is vengeance_

_That's never free_

Wilson ripped off his belt easily and smoothly. It would have made more sense to just buckle it again, but he was sick and tired of having his pants held in place by a piece of leather and a metal buckle. It was so much easier, he also conceded, to destroy something than to fix it.

Usually that sentiment seemed to be House's (try various methods to see how the patient responds—possibly damaging them—but then finding a solution), but tonight it was his. Laziness reinforced this belief and Wilson took a deep breath.

He stared at his reflection in the goldfish bowl. Sushi, Julie's goldfish, swam happily around the plastic castle and facsimile palm trees. The orange tail flicked through the water and ruined his placid look. The ripples looked like wrinkles on his face and he turned away from the bowl.

Cory Lind had been asleep the first time Wilson went to check on him. Dr. Wilkerson had requested a second opinion on the case and had asked Wilson to offer it. Wilson had taken his vitals, checked a few other stats, and was just about to leave when Lind asked for "Dr. Gregory House." Wilson though he had misheard, but Lind repeated that he wanted to see House, so Wilson relayed this information to his friend. House had cast a derisive glance in his direction and told him to leave.

"We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl," Cory Lind had repeated the Pink Floyd lyrics when Wilson walked into the middle-aged man's room for a second time.

Lost souls, Wilson thought as he stared at the fish, usually meandered through life better than ones with little purpose. His soul was not lost; it just had little purpose. Wilson remembered seeing Cuddy storm out of Lind's room without an explanation. Her high-heels clicked furiously on the floor, meaning one thing to Wilson. _Dr. Cuddy was not happy_.

"Estella's fine," Lind had told him after a few minutes.

"What?"

"Estella."

Wilson had not heard the name Estella in some twenty-five years. _Estella_.

"How do you know her?"

"I know everything. I made many mistakes, my dear Dr. Wilson, just like you have. Why haven't you ever called her? She's always wanted to meet you."

"It was a mistake."

"Ah, so you forgot…"

"I did not forget anything."

In truth, he had forgotten the little details. He forgot how Belle's chin tilted just so when he laid kisses down her flower-petal neck. He forgot how Estella had eyes reminiscent to his. He forgot how old he was when he met Belle…

That was until Cory Lind reminded him of them.

"I made a mistake, too. I was seventeen. Like you, I chose to have selective memory and erase all the thoughts I had of either woman I loved so dearly. But what does that leave either of us with? I've had six marriages each one more broken than the next. And I left the woman I really loved."

Wilson lifted the fish food container out from underneath the table. He pinched a few flakes between his fingers and then proceeded to drop them into the bowl. He watched as Sushi swam rapidly towards the flakes, devouring them as fast as he could. Wilson watched as the fish raced the food to the bottom—trying to win the race.

"We tried to win the race, my friend, and lost."

Of course we lost! Wilson had thought. Sinners are punished through the oddest of ways. Three marriages and no children to show to for them. House had always mocked him about many things, but Greg never mentioned the fact that James would be a good father…both of them knew he would be, but there were sad truths that need not be revealed to the world.

"Why do work with cancer patients? Giving bad news to dying people must make you feel like shit, doesn't it?" Cory had asked through lucid blue eyes.

He worked with cancer patients, he knew as he stared at the goldfish, because he needed to atone for his sins. Not many sins, but one _sin_…

"It killed me, Dr. Wilson. It killed me. I pray it doesn't kill you."

He didn't know if it would kill him. He didn't know his sad life (living for a job and a friendship) would kill him. He didn't know.

"It's always easier to destroy the things we love than create walls to protect them."

Estella was 25 and his daughter whom he had not seen in as many years. Belle was his lover, Estella's mother, and he had made a mistake. He had gone to college—Harvard—while the baby dashed Belle's dreams. His sin had been ruining another person's life—it was easier to destroy the bonds than connect the imaginary dots that should have been obvious to even oblivious James Wilson.

"Estella's a beautiful name. One of my favorites."

"It means 'star.' Belle was a literary lover and even if she hated _Great Expectations_, the name Estella stuck with her…"

Explaining himself to a dying man was not something he usually did. He rarely gave reasons for the things he did—he was a man and men are fundamentally flawed.

"She wants you to call. She never had a father."

After Lind had said that, House had walked in and started to berate Lind for wanting an audience with he, irascible Dr. House.

So now he sat alone looking at his wife's fish. It kept swimming around the bowl in circles. Around and around and around…

And Wilson's mind went around and around and around again and again and again. _Estella, Belle, Estella, Belle_…

Estella meant star and Belle meant consecrated to God. Two holy things that he had desecrated. He was the tragically flawed Dr. Wilson, the aw-poor-thing-look-at-those-puppy-dog-eyes doctor. He realized that his earlier logic was wrong. He wasn't a person with little purpose.

No, he was just another hopelessly screwed up human being.

He watched as his tears mixed with the water of the fish bowl.


	6. Dr Gregory House

**Author's Note: **I've been really busy (finals, etc.) these past couple weeks, so I haven't updated. MJ—sorry about the screwed up facts, I started watching _House _late, thus I didn't see _Cursed_. Thanks for correcting me, though.

_No one knows what it's like_

_To be the bad man_

_To be the sad man_

_Behind blue eyes_

The door he stood in front of was painfully average and that's what hurt him the most. The knob was a fake gold—it was tarnishing, showing the silver that lay beneath. He could feel his leg start to twinge as he realized he had been leaning on it for a few minutes longer than it could hold. He shifted his weight back to the cane and his other leg, allowing relief to materialize briefly as he reached for the Vicodin. What pained him the most, though, was the fact that Allison Cameron lived behind this average white door and she was not an average woman.

And Cory Lind had not been the average man, he remembered. Today had not been an average day. People died (not unusual—he worked at a hospital), people fell in love, and babies were born (he had to throw that in—the inevitable certainties of life.)

He walked in because he needed Wilson. But Wilson left abruptly with a sigh. House cursed silently at Wilson's abrupt departure and looked at the man on the bed. He was shriveled—he looked small, but House's eyes were drawn to the blue specks emanating from the wrinkled face.

"I've been waiting."

"For what?"

"For _whom_. I've been waiting for you."

"You're not my case."

"You're sicker than I."

House heard the sound of John Lennon floating through the space between the door and the floor. _Imagine _somersaulted, waltzed, and leaped through the air to reach his ears. He leaned his head against the door; he told himself he was listening to the music, when he was really listening to _her._

"I lied to myself, too. Love is funny, you know. It's a concept—it's intangible, different for every person. Love—"

"Is a waste of time, as this little charade is also quickly becoming."

"—Love is an idea, and I can say, minutes before I die, that I am firmly enamored by love."

Lind's blue eyes had twinkled and he coughed several times. House made no move to offer him water or to help him.

"Five years—get over the wounds. Soul mates come and soul mates go. We settle for the best we can. Fate plays with our minds and drives us to insanity if we let it. I've fought with it for too long now—it's finally caught up to me."

House contemplated his options as his head lay against the door. Leave and keep his reputation in tact or stay and make a fool out of himself. Easy the choice seemed, but the romantic inside was not going down without a fair say in the issue before him.

"I'm going to die."

House had cringed inwardly at Lind's blatantly morbid statement. The time of the comment was 5:45.

House heard the glass shatter inside the apartment. He strained to listen, but he was almost sure that a woman had also screamed. House started knocking on the door as a reaction; screaming women meant trouble. He banged with his fists. No one answered.

"My time of death will be at 5:50."

House had watched as Lind's body started to quickly deteriorate. House remembered looking at the time—5:48.

No one was answering the door, so House banged on it with his cane. If this didn't get her attention then he didn't know what would. When he gained no response from the pounding, he did the next best thing. He searched for a key.

"You're a good man, Dr. House, but a dying one."

There was a table nearby, for decorative purposes, he assumed. He clawed through the fake flowers in the fake Ming vase. He found no key, but his eye did catch on something nearby. It was a little line in the wood. He ran his fingers over it and knocked on the polished top. It was hollow. He pressed down on the lined spot, and it sprung open. There was a key to an apartment. House grabbed and prayed on Lind's dead body that he had the right one.

Cory Lind's eyes had been the last part of him to die. Even as the rest of his body shut down, his eyes sparkled vividly, fighting against the oncoming inevitable infinity. House knew that a dying man was more alive than any of the people who had recently paid visits to him.

The key fit into Cameron's lock and he opened the door. Her apartment was dark except for a light shining from what he presumed to be the kitchen. He limped as fast as his leg would let him to the kitchen where he found Cameron curled up in a ball, blood from her finger leaving a red trail on the yellowed flowers she clutched.

"Jesus, Cameron. Get up."

"Go away."

House stood straighter.

"Goodbye."

Lind's last words were gasped out and his blue eyes closed. The end had come; death had been gentle. House had not moved to save a patient. He had stood and not uttered a sarcastic comment; he let the silence stifle the life out of the man. He had moved to Lind's medical chart and wrote the time of death: 5:50.

"You're bleeding."

"No shit, Sherlock."

"Cameron, get your ass off the floor, you self-pitying moron. How old is that flower?"

"Twenty years. Get out of my house you crippled bastard."

"You saw Lind, too."

"I saw her. Yes…yeah, I did."

"Her?"

"Yes. Cory Lind, female, 45," Cameron told him as she started to pull herself up into a sitting position.

"Really?"

She shot him a look and he grabbed the cloth that was lying on the counter. He let himself fall to the floor next to her.

"Here."

He took her finger and wrapped the cloth around it. She watched as he worked.

"Thank you," she whispered.

And there they sat, among the shattered glass, among the shattered remains of their lives. Both were thinking of Cory Lind. Cameron closed her eyes first and House watched her rhythmic breath. Her breathing lulled him into a lucid state. He couldn't fall asleep, though. A small discrepancy bothered him—

Cameron thought Lind was a girl.

The next day, when he arrived at the hospital, he checked the records for a patient with the name Cory Lind. Much to his surprise, he learned that Cory Lind had never been admitted to Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital.

So, at the end, I hark back to the beginning. If I see blue, do you see blue? Can't you see red? If I see something that you don't, does it exist? Six doctors—relatively sane—saw six different patients in Cory Lind. Six different patients—four males, and two females. Some were African-Americans; some were Caucasian. Some were young; some were old. Each doctor saw a different patient—a different color.

Did this patient exist? On the day of Cory Lind's death, there certainly was a patient going by the name of Lind. Yes, the person existed enough to make six people question themselves.

Chase saw a man badly beaten by the trials of paternal alcoholism. Foreman found a hardened, successful man who came back from the dredges of society. Cameron witnessed a woman hurt by love. Cuddy observed a woman suffocated by society's demands. Wilson remembered old secrets and forgotten loves when he talked with Lind. And House saw blue eyes much more alive than his.

They saw what they wanted in Cory Lind. They saw what the _needed_. They picked their favorite color in the rainbow and chose to see that one in the gray.

House was right—they were more damaged than any of them could ever imagine.


End file.
